Posted on 20 February 2010

At the first stop on the Road To Hell, how slow must someone be before they realise that a gun might be useful?
Rest Stop Dead Ahead (2006), the first release to DVD of Raw Feed, an imprint of Warner Home Video: Jess (Joey Mendicino) and girlfriend Nicole (Jaimie Alexender) have run away from home. They’re driving to Los Angeles when they decide to take a short cut. Nicole has to pee (”Again?”), but she won’t do it on the roadside, so they end up stopping at a Rest Stop. Little does Nicole know that it would be more hygenic, and way more safer to go to the toilet on the roadside in the soil, than this particular Rest Stop.

Jess disappears and Nicole is left stranded.

Middle of nowhere? No phone signal? Teenagers alone? Deserted building? Sounds quite a common theme doesn’t it? The premise is somewhat cliched, although the effects are pretty gruesome. Strangely in this kind of film, the set pieces are way too slow, and very predictable. The suspense doesn’t build, it’s low during a set piece and then just ends on a semi-high.

The whole film is transformed into a comedic mess before it had even got half way. Saying this, the effects are suitably gruesome, making teeth and buttocks alike clench. Most are better, up a few notches. from Saw. The added aspect of the supernatural adds to the story early on.

Interestingly, when Nicole meets another abductee (Tracey Kress) in the Rest Stop’s bathroom, Tracey tells her she wanted to see the Rolling Stones play in Tucson. Later Nicole finds out that Tracey went missing in 1971. The Stones didn’t play in Tucson, Arizona until June 14th, 1972.

The real downer in the film is that the leads character just doesn’t have her head screwed on. She is just so thick. There’s a police man injured, the maniac is attacking them with his truck. She just kneels there watching as the truck rolls over his legs. Now, c’mon, but wouldn’t she have grabbed the police man’s gun and started shooting? Ok, the gun is used further on in the story, and you could say she was in shock, but when I was watching it with an audience, they were shouting, “The gun! Take the gun! Use the gun!”… And she has a few more opportunities to take and use it, before the police man actually says to her to take it, and she ends up using it.

Worth watching for the effects, but apart from that, steer clear as it’s a big disappointment.